I know, I know. About twenty years ago, when I first got really into William Faulkner and was tearing through all of his books, I realized that because he was dead, there would be no more. So once I finished reading them all, that was it. I decided to "save" a few, and this was one of them.
"Pylon" is about a group of barnstormers. Roger Schumann, his mechanic Jiggs, his parachuter Jack Holmes, and his wife Laverne and their son Jack (maybe--Jack might also be Holmes' son, no one knows for sure) are in New Valois (a thinly disguised New Orleans) for an airshow. An unnamed reporter gets caught up in their drama, much to his detriment. Roger crash lands his plane on the next to the last day, but he's determined to fly in the big race the last day to win the $2,000 prize. Unfortunately, the plane falls apart in the air and Roger is killed.
I can't imagine this was an easy book for Faulkner to write. He flew airplanes himself, but his youngest brother Dean was really into flying, and ended up being killed in a plane crash. Faulkner felt so guilty for introducing his brother to the dangerous sport that he assumed responsibility for Dean's young pregnant wife and pretty much raised their daughter, a girl named Dean after her father. It wasn't the best book I've read by him, but it had some good moments. It was just very dark and didn't have much of the black humor that most of his other books have.
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